Well Played, Bandar

A couple of weeks ago as I was stuck in traffic, I wondered why I was not moving on the ground when I had been promised by Society that I would commuting to work in a flying car by the time I was 30. According to They, by the 21st century, roads would be obsolete and cars would race through the skies with the greatest of ease, solving all our transportation woes. That's what They said.

Since there was nothing else to do but stare at the bumpers in front and behind me, I began to wonder if the technology were actually possible to make this method of transportation feasible.

The first thing state and federal governments would have to do is reserve pathways in the air so that vehicles wouldn't fly around like Doc Brown on acid. Surely that would be easy enough to do.

But then it instantly hit me why air travel will never be implemented for daily civilian use. If I'm flying down the highway at 80 and my car dies, I'm fairly confident I can slow it down and guide it safely to the side of the road. But if I'm flying (literally flying) down some pathway in the skies and my airmobile dies, there's nowhere to go but down. And probably not for a soft landing.

I hate to play bean counter, but I wonder what the projected death toll would be compared to current road-death statistics. I wonder if there is some numberless office that doesn't show up on any floor plan at the Department of Transportation where some MIT drop-out is developing actuary tables that predict deaths from car accidents in the sky.

Suddenly, I wasn't too upset to be stuck in traffic for a little while.

Several years ago, the state rep I worked for sponsored the constitutional amendment in the House that was intended to change transportation in Texas forever - but not for another fifty years. Since I wrote some of his speeches, I read more about the ins-and-outs of road transportation in Texas in two months than I had in my lifetime. This legislative package, once the voters of Texas adopted the amendment, created a separate account within the Comptroller's office to primarily finance a new road system to bypass I-35 between Dallas and San Antonio.

At the time, I was all for it. I would love to drive from Dallas to San Marcos in two hours. Even better, I would love to take a high speed train that would cut that time in less than half.

But after several years and much thought, I'm completely against it. One of the few things I have in common with the RPT.

First, in order to create such a transportation system, the government would have to abuse their power of eminent domain and confiscate way too much private property. Sorry, but once we stole our land from Mexico, we promised it would never be stolen from us again.

Second, and perhaps more important, bypassing I-35 would completely kill the small businesses and communities whose economic structure depends on suckers pulling off the highway for kolaches or whatever worthless trinkets are essential to mark one's travels.

Then on Friday, we went to see Syriana, the latest Stephen Gaghan offering. More and more, I'm starting to see Clooney as sort of a Orson Welles figure. Somebody you really can't take too seriously (wasn't he an orderly in E/R before he was a handyman in Facts of Life?) but somebody who carries tremendous weight (and not just the 35 lbs he gained for this movie).

The movie follows a CIA operative distanced from the Company once he is discovered, a lawyer shepherding a merger of two oil companies through the DOJ, an analyst helping a Middle Eastern prince modernize his country's position in the world oil market, and a Pakistani youth seduced by anti-West rantings wrapped in a religious message.

Apart from being an incredible and thought-provoking movie, it helped me re-remember why our transportation will not advance as rapidly as other technological areas and why our interstate highway system will always be stuck in the 1950's.

There are just too many parties resistant to change because it may affect profits. Public policy notwithstanding, there are just too many elements, particularly in foreign policy, that must be coordinated for change to occur, especially were we to move away from petroleum-based energy.

I have no doubt that design-and-build consortia would adapt to secure even more profitable government contracts. And car manufacturers would make a killing with new-concept designs. And no doubt the EPA would be more than satisfied with the Doc Brown fuel cylinder that converts trash to energy.

But count me out.

I don't particularly look forward to hovering twenty feet above the ground in traffic any more than I do being stuck on the ground in traffic.

Just don't land on top of my antiquated internal-combustion propelled car because you forgot to fill up on whatever fuel matter your airmobile uses.